


Patch Me Up

by DoINeedYouNow



Category: Stranger Things (TV 2016)
Genre: Aftermath of Violence, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Childhood Friends, F/M, First Aid, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, Season 2
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-08-18
Updated: 2019-09-30
Packaged: 2020-09-06 18:03:19
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 4,611
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20295697
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DoINeedYouNow/pseuds/DoINeedYouNow
Summary: Canon Divergent Season 2The reader is enjoying a quiet night in when four middle schoolers turn up on her doorstep with a battered and bruised Steve Harrington in the backseat.





	1. Chapter 1

There was frantic thumping at the front door, breaking you focus on the tv in the lounge. You shouted out a frustrated, “I’m coming,” before turning down the sound and heading to door, where someone was still pounding on the door. 

“What?” you asked, swinging the door open to find four middle-schoolers standing on your doorstep. You leaned out the door way to look at the car sitting at your driveway. You recognised the shortest, with curly hair poking our from under his cap, as Dustin Henderson, who you had done some tutoring with last year, not that he needed it. The other two were his friends Mike and Lucas, who you had seen hanging out in the home while you had been there. The fourth was a red haired girl around the same age, who looked familiar but you couldn’t quite put your finger on where you had seen her. 

You looked at the car a little closer, realisation dawning on you. 

“Is that Billy Hargrove’s car?” It had been hard to miss him roaring around the school car park before and after school. The guy reeked of trouble and you had stayed well away. Then the realisation hit. That was why the red haired girl looked familiar, you had seen her in the car, his sister most likely. 

“We need your help,” Dustin spoke up, a desperation in his voice, as his hand grabbed your jumper, pulling you from the doorway into the cold night. 

“Wait,” you pull free from his hand, but continue to follow.

“Please, he’s not looking good.” You shake your head, hoping that they haven’t brought Billy himself here. having no idea what exactly these kids have gotten themselves into. Mike opens the back door, to reveal a motionless body in the back seat. 

“Steve?” you ask, and there is a small groan from the back seat. 

Oh shit, from the light from the front porch and the street lamp you can tell he is battered and bruised. A deep gash over his eye, a swollen lip and blood covering his face. You move immediately into the back seat, managing to crouch over him in the confined space to get a closer look at his injuries. 

You look back over your shoulder at the kids crowding around the door, as if you will know what to do next. You know you need to get a better look at his wounds and just how much damage there is. 

“Let’s get him inside,” you tell them climbing back out and moving to the other side of the vehicle to be able to grab hold of his shoulders. You point to the two tallest boys, “Help me lift him.”

They give a nod and come round to the other side of the vehicle to meet you. 

Between the five of you, you manage to make your way into the house, and clumsily lower Steve on the couch, a groan leaving his lips at the impact. 

“Sorry,” you mutter, as you shoot a look at Dustin who gives an apologetic smile. You move to the cupboard in the kitchen, searching the shelves until you find the first aid kit, hoping that it has been refilled since the last time it was used. 

“Can I help?” the red haired girl asks.

“Can you get a bowl fill it with some water, and grab a towel from under the sink. And get one of your friends to grab something frozen from the freezer in the basement. I think there are some peas.” Your hands are shaking and you hold onto the counter to steady them, taking a deep breath, before moving away again.

The three boys are crowded around Steve, watching intently, with one whispering encouragement to him. You kneel beside him, opening the kit next to you on the coffee table. Tilting you head as you try to work out what to address first. 

The bowl of water is placed next to you and the girl gives you a small smile, before she turns to they boys. “Lucas can you get something frozen from downstairs.” 

Lucas gives a nod and makes his way to the hallway. 

You soak the towel in the water, before squeezing out the excess. 

“Hey, Steve,” you whisper, “It’s Y/N. This might sting a bit okay.” You gently dab the towel across his temple, moving down slowly over his eye, to his cheek careful not to add too much pressure. Sighing as the towel is quickly discoloured and you return it to the bowl to clean it off. As you return to clean the wound, there is a sharp intake of breath, and Steve’s eyes open slightly. 

“Y/N?” His hand reaches up, as if he is about to cup your cheek and your motions stop at his movement. His hand grazes your cheek, just barely, before it slumps back down to his side. 

“Yeah, me.” He goes to move up, and you gently place a hand on his shoulder stopping him, he doesn’t need much convincing to lay back into the couch. His eyes closing again. Lucas returns to the room clutching two bags of frozen peas and places them next to you on the coffee table. 

You press the towel against his lip, wincing, as the deepness of the split comes into view as you clean the blood away.

“Who did this?” You ask, turning briefly to the kids, before focusing on Steve again. You want to murder them, a protective feeling rising up inside. 

“My brother, Billy.”

“He was going to kill us,” Lucas chimes in. You clench your jaw, as your suspicions about Billy are confirmed. 

“He would have killed him, if Max didn’t knock him out.” Mike adds. You raise an eyebrow at this, how exactly a girl of Max’s size could take out someone like Billy. 

“There was a sedative,” she shrugs, pulling her jacket sleeves over her hands. A sedative? That raises more questions than it answers. 

“And you’re all here because?” It still didn’t quite make sense how exactly they had come to your home. 

“Steve was in and out of it, but he told us to come here.” Why would he have told them that? You and Steve had barely spoken since middle school. A passing glance in the school hallway was all that you had shared in the past year. 

He was King Steve after all, and you were, well, you. 

It had been simpler when you were younger, living next door to each other on the same street, around the same age, it had been almost inevitable that you had become friends. He had come to our house when things became too much at home. When his Dad was in one of his ‘moods’. 

Your mom always would make you both a plate full of grilled cheese, which you would take to your treehouse, pretending that you had run away, making this place your home, a childhood fantasy escape. 

He had been your first kiss up in that treehouse. It was only a peck on the lips, but you had held onto that memory since that day and could recount every aspect of it. 

But all that had changed once you got to high school. Steve had always been good at making friends, and being popular had come easily to him. You had struggled and been left behind. It hurt, but you thought of it as the natural progression of things. People change and no good thing lasts forever. 

“Is he going to be okay?” 

“I think so,” you said your voice wavering as you applied another bandage, pulling the wound closed. You took one of the bags of peas, pressing it against his eye, hoping to bring down the swelling that was starting to develop. 

“We need to go Dustin,” Mike whispered. 

“Where are you going?” 

“We need to do something.” Mike answered, cryptically. 

“At this time of the night?”

“Our friends are in danger.” 

“Wait a second, Steve was out cold in the back seat,” you turn towards Max, “you drove here. Can you even reach the pedals?”

“We used a brick,” Dustin volunteered proudly. 

“Well you can’t go out there again.” 

“You could drive us to the field.” Dustin suggested. 

“Yeah, that way we might actually get there in one piece.” You considered the four friends before looking back down at Steve. You couldn’t leave him here, if he deteriorated someone needed to be with him. But you couldn’t let these kids go out on their own. Especially with Billy still unaccounted for. 

You let out a groan of frustration, “Fine, but we can’t leave him here. We need to get him back in the car.”

“We need supplies.” Dustin suggested, “Gloves, goggles, protection.”

“Protection from what?”

“Do you have something like that?” Mike asks, ignoring the question. 

“Go have a look in the basement, there may be some of my dad’s work gear.” You suggested, giving up on trying to reason with the determined kids, wondering how exactly Steve had gotten mixed up in all of this. The Steve you knew, wouldn’t have been caught dead babysitting a bunch of middle schoolers. Even if one of them happened to be Nancy Wheeler’s brother. 

The kids disappeared from the room, as you began to repack the first aid kit, ready to take with you to wherever it was you were going. A hand brushed up against your own, which you had left over Steve’s without even realising. 

“Y/N?” Steve had come to again, and seemed just as confused by your presence as he had before. He started to look around frantically, his eye not covered by the bag of peas darting around the room, “where?”

“They’re fine.” You answered. Placing your hand gently on his chest, his breathing calming at your touch. “They are getting supplies.” He goes to move again, resting on his elbows in an attempt to stand up. 

“Whoah,” you place your hands firmly on his shoulders keeping him in place, “You need to keep still. Billy really did a number on you.”

“You patched me up?”

“Yeah, just like old times,” you say with a chuckle, remembering putting a Smurfs band aid on his knee after he came off the tire swing, years ago. Placing a gentle kiss to his cheek in the promise it would make him ‘all better’, ignoring the blush that immediately spread across your cheeks. 

“We can’t let them go,” he sighed. Holding the bag to his eye as he winced in pain. 

“I don’t think we can stop them. And there is no way I am letting them drive out to a field in the middle of nowhere to do God knows what.”

“I’ll drive them, you don’t need to,” 

“You are in no condition to drive. And you brought all this to my doorstep.“ There was no way you were letting Steve or those kids out of your sight. You know there is something he isn’t telling you. 

“Why did you bring them here anyway? It’s not like we’re friends. Not anymore.” You look away, concentrating on sorting the items back into the first aid kit. “I mean, you have Nancy now.” You wish you could take it back as soon as the words leave your lips, it sounds bitter, it sounds jealous. 

Steve gives a small smile, as much as his face will allow him, “Didn’t you hear? She, um, we broke up.”

“Oh,” your voice is quiet, as you let the news hit you, “sorry.” You had heard that she had left the school early yesterday with Jonathon Byers, but you had just attributed that to high school rumours. 

“You always looked out for me, since we were kids and I’ve been an asshole, I shouldn’t have let popularity get in the way of our friendship. It was a dick move.”

“The kids said that you stood up to Billy, that you saved them and he did this to you.” You push back the hair from his forehead, you fingers trailing down his cheek. 

“You should see him,” he gives a chuckle which quickly turns into a cough as his hand grips his side. You place your own hand over his, concerned that there may be more to his injuries than what you can see on the surface. 

“That’s not something a popular high school asshole would usually do.” You say in a low whisper, and he smiles back at you. A tension settling over the room as his thumb moves over your knuckles. 

“Okay we have everything,” Dustin announces loudly as the troop re-enters the living room, holding an assortment of items. You snatch your hand away, and get up quickly. 

“Oh good, you’re awake.” Dustin, reaches over to pat Steve’s shoulder, “You almost had him, really, this close.” 

“Thanks Dustin,” Steve mumbles as he manages to sit up on the couch, as you watch him closely, looking for any further signs of a concussion, but are relived to see that there is some colour returning to his skin. 

“We need to get this into the car,” Mike says holding up the ‘supplies’, Max holds up the car keys in her hand and moves to the door, the other kids following suit. 

“Guess we are moving on then,” you sigh, standing up and holding out your hand for Steve to hold onto to. You pull him up into a standing position and although he wavers slightly, placing his weight onto your shoulder for a brief moment, he manages to steady himself and move towards to the front door. You hold onto his waist just in case, he falters down the steps but loosen your grip as you walk down the driveway. 

Lucas is slamming the car boot shut as you approach the vehicle, Dustin, Max and Mike already in the back seat. You move Steve around to the passenger seat, and he leans his hand against the vehicle for support. 

“Shit,” you mutter as you look up to see that the cut above his eye has reopened. The first aid kit is still sitting on the coffee table. 

“Wait here for a second,” you tell Steve as you race back into the house to retrieve the kit. As you approach the front door to leave you hear it, an engine starting. You break out into a run as you drop the first aid kit and run out to the car. Steve is in the driver seat, with Lucas beside him. 

You bash on the closed window with your fist, while your other hand pulls desperately at the car door handle, “Steve, open the door,” you shout, “Open the fucking door!” Both of your fists slam against the window. 

“Sorry, Y/N, I can’t let you get involved with this.” 

You thump again, before moving back away from the car, “Please Steve.” You try again, a lump in your throat, that makes the words come out more pitiful than you intend. 

“Forgive me,” he says as the engine revs and the car speeds away from your house, leaving you holding your head in your hands, cursing Steve Harrington. 


	2. A Door Left Open

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Following on from the night Steve and the kids left Reader to save their friends. Steve is still hoping there may be a chance to redeem himself.

The all too familiar rumble of a car engine, filled the quiet street, and you pulled the curtains closed sharply. You pulled a record from your shelf, placing it on your player, gently dropping the needle as a car door slammed shut outside. As soon as the sound started to pour out of the speakers you turned up the volume, hoping that perhaps the signal that you didn’t want to come out would be clear. 

You flopped back on your bed, staring at the ceiling. How the fuck did things get so complicated?

There was a quiet knock on your door, and you reluctantly got back up from your bed, turning down the music and opening the door wide enough to see who was knocking. Ready to give Steve Harrington a piece of your mind if he had managed to sweet talk your parents into gaining access to your door. 

“Hey honey.” 

It was your mom. She gave you an apologetic smile and you knew what she was about to tell you. You sighed opening the door wider to allow your mom to come in, while you slumped back down on the bed. 

She went to your curtains, pulling them back open, a groan leaving your lips as you moved away from the light, closing your eyes. 

“He’s here again, honey,” she said, the bed dipping as she took a seat at the edge. 

“I know.” You sighed, getting up to sit next to her, intently focusing on the laces of your sneakers.

He had turned up at your house for a few days now, after you had refused to speak to him on the phone. It had been two weeks since he had been delivered to your doorstep by four middle schoolers after getting the shit beaten out of him by Billy Hargrove. 

Two weeks since he had left you screaming at him in your driveway, while he drove off into the night. 

“Look, I don’t know what happened between you two, but maybe you should at least hear him out?”

“Mom, Steve and I haven’t been friends in a while, he isn’t the same.” 

Neither were you. No longer willing to take things at face value, a question to everyone’s motivations. 

“People change, honey, but he was always a good kid. With a hard life. Maybe he lost his way a little, but, like I said, people can change.” She gave your shoulder a nudge with her own, and you groaned. 

“Plus I think if he turns up here one more time, your dad is going to lose it.” 

Your mom had been remarkably restrained up to this point, she had been about to question you about it that first morning, until she saw the look on your face. Your father had briefly looked up from his paper, a scowl on his face, before he returned to his morning routine. 

“Fine. I guess I can talk to him.” You try to ignore the smile that graces her face, always knowing that your mom had a soft spot for Steve, it’s probably the only thing that has saved him from your dad’s wrath.

“I’ll let him up.” She says, getting up from your bed, “Just remember to keep the door open, for your dad.” She added with a wink that made you groan inwardly, your cheeks flushing hot at the implication. 

You flop back on your bed as your mind races through what just could come of Steve Harrington walking through that door into your room. The memory of screaming into the night in your driveway was still so fresh. A sick feeling in your stomach that the car that sped down your street was heading for doom. While you kneeled hopeless in your driveway. 

You sat up again at the quite knock on the door frame. Your door opening slowly to reveal in the doorway an uncommonly sheepish looking Steve Harrington. He didn’t enter, instead leaning up against the doorframe, waiting for an invitation. 

He looked infinitely better than the night he had been laying on your couch while you tended to his wounds. The gash above his eye, had healed up, the bruising faded. His bottom lip still slightly swollen and marked. 

“You look good,” you mutter while he stands just inside of your room, “I mean,” you examine the laces of your shoes again, “you look better.”

He pushes his hair back from his face, “Yeah. Thanks.” He shoved his hands in his pocket, shifting his position up against the door. “I had a good nurse.” He adds, with a smile, as if if he can smile enough you might just catch it. 

You keep your face straight. Trying to quell that feeling in your gut that is relieved to see that he is okay. The deputy had told you as much as soon as you had finally worn them down enough that night to give you some information. 

He had gone to the hospital, the police were with him, so were the kids and he was okay. Once that was confirmed you allowed yourself to give into that anger again. 

“You going to stand in my doorway all afternoon?” There is an edge to your tone, as you set the rules about just who is in control here. Your letting him in, not the other way around. 

He takes a seat next to you on the bed, the bed dipping under his weight as he maintains a safe distance between you both. You note how he chooses to sit next to you on your bed, not the safer option of the chair near your desk. You don’t know whether to be flattered by his bold choice of seating position or annoyed that he thinks he can win his way back so easily. 

“I didn’t want to see you again,” you admit, moving away, putting a further distance between you, while you concentrate on the material of your jean shorts. Pulling at a loose thread, near the pocket. 

“I know,” he sighs, raking a hand through his hair, “But, I couldn’t leave things the way they were.”

“You mean when you drove off in the middle of the night, with a possible concussion in a car full of kids to some undisclosed location, and I had no idea where you were, if you were okay, if they were okay.” The calm facade dissolves giving way to the barely concealed anger. The hurt and betrayal seeping through your words.

“I know,” he repeats, his head bowed, unable to meet your eyes. 

“I was so fucking scared.” You berate yourself for the tears welling in your eyes, reliving the moment when you thought you might lose him again. “You just turned up at my door.” You sniff loudly, trying to keep yourself from losing your words to the sobs threatening to take hold. 

His hand reaches out to lay over your hands in your lap, stilling your fingers from fidgeting.

“Some really messed up things happened and I couldn’t let you get dragged into them.” 

“Tell me.”

“Y/N, we don’t need to-”

“Do you know how many times in my mind I had imagined what it would be like to have Steve Harrington turning up on my doorstep? To go back to how things were.”

It was embarrassing, how much you had wanted Steve, your friend back. But he was another person now, one who had ignored your in the hallways, who had point blank told Tommy he had no idea who you were. 

You had cried into your pillow, every night for a week. Your mom sitting next to you, her hand gently on your shoulder, while you refused to tell her what was wrong. What you had lost. 

“And it wasn’t even like you were gone, I still had to see you everyday, be invisible to you, and yet still want you to notice me like some … airhead.” You shook your head, embarrassed to let all of this out, but it was as if the floodgates had opened and you were powerless to close them now. Your emotions spilling out of your mouth, you couldn’t stop them now if you tried.

“And then, you asked for me, you came to me and I guess I felt, like maybe, for a brief moment things might go back to the way they were.”

He goes to speak and you put up your hand, stopping him. 

“And when you left,” a sad chuckle leaves your lips, “same old King Steve. Using people for what he needs and just letting them go again.”

“What we were going to do that night was dangerous, Y/N. I saw an opportunity to protect you from it and I took it.” 

“Protect me from what? Just tell me Steve. You want to make things right, then tell me.”

He took a deep breath, his hand moving to his hair again. As he looked out your window. “You wouldn’t believe me. I wouldn’t.”

“Try me.” You say determination written across your face. 

And he does, the whole thing. The events of the Christmas previous, the lab, the killer dogs and the dirty secret that threatened to consume the town of Hawkins. 

You try to comprehend what he has told you. How it could possibly be true. A little concerned that maybe Billy’s beating actually did cause some permanent damage. 

“Steve-”

“Honest, Y/N, it’s true.” You meet his eyes. And true or not, he believes it. There is a fear there that is genuine. 

“When we drove off that night we were going to try to distract it-them from attacking Chief Hopper and Eleven - the girl from the lab-, and there was a chance we wouldn’t make it back to the surface.” 

You shake your head in disbelief, it’s like something out of one of your sci fi novels, so unbelievable that no-one, not even someone with the confidence of Steve, would use as an excuse to why they go driving into the night with a pile of middle schoolers. So unbelievable it has to be the truth. 

“You had just helped me, despite everything, I couldn’t repay you by allowing you to involve yourself. To risk having you hurt. After everything I had done.”

“I can’t believe, all this time, there has been this thing around us.” To think that there was this other worldly force in their small town, and that so many people were involved in the cover up. 

“It’s gone now though.” 

“So things can go back to normal.” You give a nod of understanding. He’s said his peace, apologised and now you can go back to ignoring each other in the hallways. Pretending not to notice each other, not to care. 

“Maybe that’s not what I want.”

“What?” 

“Since that night, I kept asking myself how I ended up your doorstep. I mean you’re right we hadn’t spoken in two years. But I guess,” he takes a deep sigh, “I needed, to feel safe. The only place that has ever felt like home.”

The look in his eyes, makes your breath hitch. An actual genuine admission from Steve Harrington. 

“Steve-” 

“I was a massive asshole. I thought I had everything I wanted. I thought people liked me, loved me even, but it was all a lie. One I had fooled myself into believing. But when I was here, I felt it.”

His eyes meet yours and despite the fact that you want to look away, you can’t, this has been what you have been waiting for, isn’t it? You had played this conversation in your own mind so many times, exactly what you would say, and now you can only sit there. 

“Not because I was King Steve, or popular, because I was me. Just me.” His hand moves over yours and your heartbeat speeds up, while you remind yourself not to fall back into old habits so easily. “And that that was enough.”

“What do you want Steve?” You ask, afraid of the answer. Afraid of the rejection, but holding onto a hope of something else. 

“I thought maybe we could start with ice cream?” He asks, a smile beginning to form on his lips as you raise your eyebrow. “Mint Choc Chip right?” 

You manage a nod, still not sure exactly what it is you’re agreeing to, but his warm smile makes you want to take his hand, and see where ice-cream with Steve may lead. 


End file.
